Your eCommerce Site Has a Conversion Problem (And It's Because of Your UX Design)

Dont be mistaken into thinking that the UX of your website is just what it looks like (this is the User interface or UI design), yes that might be a part of whats holding back your eCommerce site from fulfilling its potential, but more likely there is a wealth of untapped opportunity by exploring the UX design.

The discipline of user experience is broad, but ultimately has the goal of creating an experience (which may include online and offline journeys) that makes a consumer happy, or at least meets their expectations and doesnt confuse or frustrate them.

We will cover:

• The importance of user experience in eCommerce
• Understanding your users: Assumptions wont cut it
• 3 user research methods to get into the minds of your website visitors
• What are user personas (and whats their role in UX design)?
• How user journeys affect conversion
• Designing the user journey for mobile
• How to improve eCommerce UX to boost mobile conversions
• eCommerce website design best practices: A 36-point checklist to create the best eCommerce site

The importance of user experience in eCommerce
Achieving these goals is vital for generating online sales, as it will literally make or break a sale. According to Forrester Research, every $1 invested in UX can give a $100 return, and so it shows that a few informed changes to your online experience can help optimize conversion rate and provide an impressive return on investment.

Understanding your users: Assumptions wont cut it
The very foundations of user experience are built upon knowing your users, and this means really understanding them. It doesnt mean making assumptions or just having opinions on what they want, like or expect, but actually doing the research to provide the evidence that supports your understanding. How can you begin to design in a user-centric way if you dont really know your customers?

Once you have the research, you can turn this into actionable insights to inform your web design decisions, and that isnt just the colors and images to use, but the processes and interactions that need refining to solve the conversion problems.

3 user research methods to get into the minds of your website visitors
There are different ways to gain insights into your customers.

What are user personas (and whats their role in UX design)?

UX personas are fictional representations of your actual website users and will often include their needs, interests, goals of their website visit, their attitudes, motivations, expectations and technical ability.

User Personas are created by the research and insight gathered by speaking with your users directly as mentioned above, including those who buy from you and those that dont. The first step is to identify who your different user types are. The personas are used to test different relevant online journeys from the mindset of the different user types (rather than through the eyes of a designer, developer or marketer).

Personas are used to help teams make decisions whilst thinking in the mindset of different consumers. They help marketers, UX professionals, designers, and developers to understand what users are thinking and feeling. This helps in order to better meet their customers needs with a more optimized experience.

How user journeys affect conversion
User journeys are the paths that people take to reach their goal. A goal might be to purchase home insurance, a camera or a holiday. A consumer will go through a number of steps (known as Tasks) to achieve their end goal, this may include brand and/or product research, customer reviews and price comparisons. It is likely that these tasks dont all take place in one session or on a single device.

By mapping out the different user journeys in the different context (or Scenarios) in which they take place, means that you can identify opportunities to optimize the experience and make it easier for the consumer to reach their goal when they are ready.

In reality, the journey will likely be more complex, crossing multiple channels and devices.

All too often consumers are faced with obstacles and barriers to completing their online journey resulting in a lost sale for your business. Whether it is too many steps in a process, a forgotten password, confusion on what to do next or distractions from too many messages, refining the online journey to optimize the user experience can directly reap conversion rewards for eCommerce websites.

There are a number of techniques that can be applied to help optimize an online journey, but its important to realize that what works for some websites, wont work for others, and that is purely because of the consumers. Simply applying best practice UX changes wont guarantee an increase in conversion and certainly wont unlock the potential in your own online experience.

Read this next: 14 Advanced Tips on Increasing Your eCommerce Conversion Rate (with Examples)

Find out about:

• Designing the user journey for mobile
• How to improve eCommerce UX to boost mobile conversions
• eCommerce website design best practices: A 36-point checklist to create the best eCommerce site

on the rest of our blog, here